Death penalty debate set early 2017
House Deputy Speaker Capiz Rep. Fredenil Castro yesterday said the discussions on the bill to reinstate death penalty, a priority legislative measure of President Duterte, will be moved to early next year, so that congressmen would have a thorough plenary debate.
In a radio interview, Castro said he was responsible for moving back the bill’s discussion on the floor because he wanted to prepare to defend it at the plenary.
Castro is one of the principal authors of House Bill No. 1, which seeks to reimpose capital punishment for heinous crimes after it was abolished by then President and now Pampanga Rep. Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
“We have to let people know, make them understand and study this measure because at first glance, you could say you don’t want this bill because life should be respected. This is a reason that is based on one’s belief in God and what they call human rights,” Castro said in Filipino.
“It’s funny because our people might again be misled. This is why I myself said I want to prepare for the debate because I will be the one to stand at the plenary. I will be the one to fight for this bill…there would be very good interpellators who are now saying they have not made up their mind whether or not they would support this bill,” Castro said.
He said the measure could be passed in the Lower House if there would be daily plenary debates on it.
Castro also said he informed House Speaker Pantaleon Alvarez and Majority Floor Leader Rodolfo Fariñas, his coauthors, that the proposal should not single out drug dealing and drug use.
Castro said if he had his way, he would add more crimes that are as heinous as the use and sale of illegal drugs to be punishable by death—
crimes such as illegal recruitment, plunder, economic sabotage and human trafficking, including the ones conducted via cyberspace.
There are 21 heinous crimes proposed to be punishable by death in the bill approved by the House justice committee—a number which Castro still considers “too small.”
Among the “heinous crimes” included in House Bill No. 1 are treason, qualified piracy, qualified bribery, parricide, murder, infanticide, rape, kidnapping and serious illegal detention, robbery with violence, destructive arson, plunder.
It also includes dangerous drug importation, sale and trading, manufacture, possession, cultivation and unlawful prescription, misappropriating confiscated illegal drugs and planting of evidence by public officers, and car theft.
